Films in English

Here you'll find a collection of films from the bpb media library on political and historical issues with an English language version or English subtitling. It contains a variety of different formats such as interviews, speeches and documentaries. Keep in mind that some of the teasers are in German though.

Films in English

A short film about our work

"The German Federal Agency for Civic Education is something very special. It’s a government agency that provides Citizens in Germany with information about all areas of politics - explained in simple terms and without being tainted by party politics." (long version: 7 minutes)

VoteMatch Network

The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan.

The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan.

The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan.

The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan.

The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan.

The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan.

Seeking Refuge - experiences of young refugees

Rachel's family is Christian and is both threatened and excluded in their Muslim country. The family flees to Europe. However, after a short, unburdened time they are in custody pending deportation. Back where they came from, the family is even more...

Navid belongs to the ethnic group of the Kurds and faces repressions in Iran. Since his father increasingly suffers from all the restrictions, he flees to Europe. Navid and his mother follow him several years later. Although there are many dangerous...

As a three-year-old, Juliane is put into an orphanage. Coincidentally, she finds her mother who had to flee from home due to political persecution. Together they find refuge in Europe. Although Juliane struggles to adapt to her new life, she soon...

As a ten-year-old, Hamid and his mother flee from their home country Eritrea to escape the border conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia. They are forced to leave Hamid’s father behind because he is entrusted with confidential information. Following...

At the age of ten Ali escapes with his grandmother from war-ravaged Afghanistan. His parents, however, are not allowed to leave the country. Ali feels all too often lonesome in his new environment, for he has not heard from his parents since his...

Auschwitz today

Auschwitz – the place that more than any other symbolises the horror of the Nazi extermination machine. The name of this town in the south of Poland stands for the murder of millions of Jews, Sinti, Roma and countless other individuals who,...

Photographer Martin Blume has been working on the site of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp for more than four years. During this time he has encountered numerous survivors. In talking to them, he uses his photographs to trigger their...

Photographer Martin Blume has been working on the site of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp for more than four years. During this time he has encountered numerous survivors. In talking to them, he uses his photographs to trigger their...

Photographer Martin Blume has been working on the site of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp for more than four years. During this time he has encountered numerous survivors. In talking to them, he uses his photographs to trigger their...

Photographer Martin Blume has been working on the site of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp for more than four years. During this time he has encountered numerous survivors. In talking to them, he uses his photographs to trigger their...

Since 2009 Martin Blume has been working on a photographic series on the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp to keep the memory of the Shoa, the Porajmos and other genocides committed by the Nazis alive for future generations. In this film he...

In the traditional Ladino language of her Sephardic Jewish ancestors, Güler Orgun tells us how her family found a new home in the Ottoman Empire after being expelled from Spain in the late 15th century. We learn why her parents converted to Islam,...

The noted journalist and author Jindřich Lion takes us through his remarkable life. From interwar Czechoslovakia to Palestine, then back home to begin again, only to leave when the Soviets invaded his country in 1968.

Lilli Tauber grew up in a small town in Austria, Wiener Neustadt, where her parents tended the family store. Then came 9 November 1938. Her parents got Lilli onto a kindertransport to England. From her refuge in Great Britain, Lilli wrote countless...

The Kalefs are one of the Belgrade's oldest families, tracing their roots back more than 300 years. When the Nazis sweep into Serbia, the catholic priest Father Andrej Tumpej helps the two sisters Matilda and Breda to hide.

This is the story of two jewish families in Bulgaria. Larry Anzhel and Rosa Varsano met for the first time in Sofia and fell in love. Together they lived through a changing Bulgaria, witnessing the end of the war, the Communist regime, and the fall...

Various forms of democracy exist in different countries of the world - and accordingly, there are various opinions on who profits most from it and which problems are inherent to this kind of political system.

Research, memory and education are the main topics of the place of remembrance Yad Vashem - this applies for the museum in Jerusalem as well as the website. For Na’ama Shik it's a moral obligation to put the comprehensive archive online.

Na'ama Shik (Yad Vashem, Jerusalem) gave this speech at the panel "Global remembrance culture on the net? – Websites and educational offerings internationally" at the international conference httpasts://digitalmemoryonthenet in Berlin, on April 15,...

Ita Amahorseija (Anne Frank House, Amsterdam) gave this lecture at the panel "Global remembrance culture on the net? – Websites and educational offerings internationally" at the international conference httpasts://digitalmemoryonthenet in Berlin,...

Edward Serotta (Centropa, Jewish Witnesses of a European Century, Vienna) gave a speech about "Using Advanced Technologies to Preserve Jewish Memory" at the international conference httpasts://digitalmemoryonthenet in Berlin, held on April 14 - 16,...

David Klevan (US Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington) gave this speech at the panel "Global remembrance culture on the net? – Websites and educational offerings internationally" at the international conference httpasts://digitalmemoryonthenet in...

To Save Pop Culture (Zur Rettung der Popkultur)

An old hippie, white plait and leather vest, sleeps at a long wooden bar. His hand starts to move autonomously. Initially, it seems to put somebody off. But then it starts to beat the clock. Slowly, his whole body gets caught by the rythm.

Henrik Mauler and Jamie Raap operate the video production company "Zeitguised" in London. In 2005, they won the price for the best German music video at the 51st International Short Film Festival in Oberhausen.

In the nineties, the journalist Adrian Wood discovered unknown footage of the film "Ghetto". In this interview, he explains why it is important to use archive material in an historically correct manner.

How are historical narratives instrumentalized in the post-Soviet region?

The panel discussion is titled "Glue or solvent? Memory politics and the future of Europe". Facilitated by Jochen Hellbeck, Rutgers University, it opened up a geographically differentiated perspective, not only implicitly questioning Miller’s...

In his opening presentation Steven Stegers set out the activities of the European Association of History Educators that relate to Eastern Europe. Stegers emphasised the inherent connectedness of interpretation of history and politics – in every...

Memory politics and memory wars in postcommunist Europe and their impact on European memory culture

Alexei Miller’s introductory keynote: "Memory politics and memory wars in post-communist Europe and their impact on European memory culture". He spoke on the former socialist countries and their attempts at shifting the emphasis of their cultures...

Panel 3 "Memory in the Digital Age" looked at the different forms of digital memory cultur. It asked for the impact of digital media on the rememberance culture of a younger generations but also for the dangers of creating spaces of remembrance that...

Interviews - various

In contrast to classical school subjects, art and culture education is not about the impartation of learning content, says Jerzy Moszkowicz. Only cultural education can contribute to the creation of a human person.

In 2016, it's once again time for the U.S. to elect it's president. Just like every four years the question arises again whether there's a democrat or republican moving into the White House. But how exactly does the election work in the U.S.? To...

Two little villages in Germany have to give shelter to refugees. What kind of concerns do the inhabitants of the villages have? What can they do in order to help their new neighbours? And which expectations do the refugees have of their life?

"The German Federal Agency for Civic Education is something very special. It’s a government agency that provides Citizens in Germany with information about all areas of politics - explained in simple terms and without being tainted by party...

"The German Federal Agency for Civic Education is something very special. It’s a government agency that provides Citizens in Germany with information about all areas of politics - explained in simple terms and without being tainted by party...

NECE - Network Citizenship Education Europe

NECE is an initiative for networking citizenship education in Europe. It was started in 2004 by the German Federal Agency for Civic Education together with partners in the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, the Czech...

lecture series "Making sence of the digital society"

Issues such as AI are becoming increasingly important to our society. How should it be handled in the future? The Professor Elena Esposito studies problems of time in social systems, including memory and forgetting, fashion and transience,...

How does the general public fulfill its function of social self-understanding in times of hate speech and fake news? Who carries responsibility in the network for the realization of social expectations? Is Facebook a media company - and how should...

How is power constituted in the digital society? Who is powerful – and how can power be countered and contested? The advent of digitally networked technologies has long been thought to foster democratisation and emancipation, to empower people that...

As a professor of sociology, Marion Fourcarde asks in her lecture: How is social order constituted and legitimated in a society ruled by digital classifiers and associated actuarial techniques? What do these developments mean for fundamental...

Can cities be smart – and should they be in the first place? What are the interests and values embodied in these infrastructures? How do we make sure that cities in the digital society remain public spaces?

The lecture will discuss how a new social order is being created as the key means to stabilise and enforce these developments. This new order creates new dependencies on platforms through which data is extracted, and also produces new forms of social...

In October 2018, the European Parliament approved an EU draft directive of the European Commission concerning the reduction of plastic waste. The draft directive determines a reduction of plastic use, especially of disposable plastics. Now, the EU...

This year's NECE conference in Marseille provided a platform for the development of strategies on how citizenship education and civil society can counter the negative trend in liberal democracy and defend the civic space and basic democratic rights...